


Curiosity Killed the Cat -

by draagonfly



Series: NoiAo Week 2016 [3]
Category: DRAMAtical Murder - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, NoiAo Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-11
Packaged: 2018-05-12 17:57:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5675254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/draagonfly/pseuds/draagonfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>- but there was no satisfaction to bring it back.</p><p>Written for NoiAo Week Day 3: Challenges</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Challenges

**Author's Note:**

> This is Part 1 of a two part story, Part 2 will be up for Day 5!

Noiz had always had an interest in Ren, ever since that first night in Aoba’s room when he showed surprising cognitive awareness for an old model ALLmate. He had thought that Aoba had replaced the AI with one from a newer model, sentimentality keeping him from just replacing it altogether. That theory had more holes than swiss cheese, but given the situation back then, he hadn’t had a lot of free time to wonder too much about it. As he and Aoba became closer throughout the events in Oval Tower, he only discovered more and more abnormalities in Ren’s thoughts and behavior – enough that it still plagued him now, over a year later.

Noiz needed to know what exactly Ren was.

“Hey, let me see Ren for a bit.” He and Aoba were spending the day at home, neither wanting to brave the winter weather. As he sat in his favorite spot (on the floor, surrounded by various hologram screens) he decided now was a good a time as any to investigate the ALLmate more closely. His tinkering in Platinum Jail hadn’t told him much of anything.

“Huh? Why?” Figures, Aoba was extremely protective of Ren, to the point of ridiculousness in Noiz’s opinion.

“Just let me. I’ve been wanting to check him out for a year.” Noiz extended his hands out to reach for the dog, only to have Aoba snatch him away and hold him against his chest. Noiz sighed, not understanding his attachment to a machine. “Please?”

“What are you going to do?” Aoba’s suspicious glare hurt a little. Didn’t Aoba trust him? As if reading Noiz’s thoughts, he continued. “It’s not that I don’t trust you, you know I do. I just…”

“It’s fine. I don’t really get it, but I won’t do anything besides look. I’ll download the data from his AI chip into Usagimodoki –“

“Wait, don’t you have to remove the chip to do that?” Aoba looked like Noiz had said he wanted to sever a leg.

“Well, yeah. Just for a few minutes to copy it to Usagi’s memory.”

“No.”

Noiz was shocked at the intensity of Aoba’s refusal. Outwardly, nothing changed, but inside his mind was spinning. Aoba had never denied anything so harshly before.

“But I just –“

“I said no, Noiz. I’ve never taken out his AI, and I just have a bad feeling about it. If you want to plug him into Usagi and look that way, fine. But don’t take anything out.” Aoba turned away back to his coil, effectively ending the conversation. Noiz was speechless, and more curious than ever about what sort of ALLmate could make its owner this attached, this protective. But Aoba had said no, and so he would leave it be. He turned, still bewildered, back to his myriad of screens, barely noticing the lines of code scrolling by.

* * *

He couldn’t leave it be. Ever since his conversation with Aoba yesterday, his curiosity was eating him alive. As much as he hated going against Aoba’s wishes, he wouldn’t be able to understand anything without removing the AI. So he waited until Aoba left for his German class – he had stopped taking Ren with him since he knew the way and was much better at speaking with the locals – and took Ren from his spot in the bedroom into his office, where he had Usagi and his programs ready to transfer the data. It would be quick, five minutes tops, and then he could spend as much time as he wanted looking it over himself. He debated telling Aoba about it after the fact, but ultimately decided against it. He had a feeling no matter how much time passed, Aoba’s anger would never subside.

More carefully than was strictly necessary, he opened up the panel on Ren’s stomach and removed the AI chip, inserting it into Usagi’s microchip port. Usagi had been instructed to download the data quickly but under no circumstances to allow alterations or corruptions to the original chip. Aoba would really never forgive him if he broke Ren even temporarily. A stab of guilt pierced him as the data was transferred, but he pushed it aside. Everything would be fine.

Finally, with a quiet _P!_ a completion message popped up onto the screen and Usagi ejected the chip.

“No complications?”

“P! Copy successful! No corruptions or changes to original files, P!”

Noiz released the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. Just as carefully as before, he reinserted the chip into Ren and quickly returned him to his place in the bedroom. The easy part was over. Now he sat down to thoroughly investigate this mysteriously advanced ALLmate.

* * *

Two hours later Noiz was beyond frustrated. There were no abnormalities or complicated updates in Ren’s AI that would account for his uncanny intelligence. Nothing to suggest anything besides small tweaks and tune ups that any experienced ALLmate owner would know how to do. The chip was still the same version that came from the manufacturer, and the personality sliders were all standard fare. Noiz scowled and opened up the next most relevant folder (which likely wasn’t relevant at all) right as Aoba walked in the door.

“I’m home!” Noiz heard him shuffling his shoes off and walking into the bedroom to get Ren. He had decided to tell him that he had plugged him in to Usagimodoki and copied the data that way, it wasn’t the truth, but it was better than pretending he had done nothing at all. There was really not much difference anyway. He was thinking about how to bring it up, when Aoba walked into the office and sat next to him. “I’m back.” Aoba kissed him on the cheek, and Noiz felt another, stronger pang of guilt in his chest.

“Welcome home.” Noiz switched out of Ren’s AI data and opened up another, less interesting but also less incriminating project. “How was class?”

“The usual. The teacher says my pronunciation is getting better. _Muss ich fließend klingen?_ ” He chuckled and Noiz smiled at the attempt.

“Like a native.”

“Liar.” Noiz winced. “What do you want for dinner tonight? I was thinking of cooking something warm.” Noiz pondered for a moment, trying to force away the guilt threating to overpower him.

“Hm. Stew?” Aoba considered it and nodded.

“Sure, stew sounds good. I’ll need to go the grocery store though.” Aoba set Ren down in front of him and pressed his forehead, letting him start up fully with his standard greeting.

“Good evening, Aoba.”

“Hey, Ren, can you make a list of things we need to pick up for stew tonight? And find directions to the closest grocery store.”

“Understood. Commencing notepad program. Calculating route to nearest grocery store.”

Aoba tilted his head in confusion, and Noiz froze for half a second. That was definitely not normal. “Why are you doing that, Ren? You sound like Usagimodoki.”

“I am notifying you of the processes taking place to complete your request.” Ren answered in stilted, mechanic sentences, not at all like his usual conversational tone (conversational for an ALLmate, anyway). Sweat began to form on Noiz’s brow.

“But why…” Aoba went silent, and Noiz chanced a quick glance over to assess his reaction. Aoba was sitting eerily still, staring directly into Ren’s eyes as though that would tell him exactly what wrong. When he spoke, the low calmness in his voice sent chills down Noiz’s spine. “This isn’t Ren.”

“Aoba?”

“What did you do.”

Noiz sat dumbly, wide eyed at the fury slowly building and emanating from his boyfriend. Nothing should have changed at all during the transfer, not even Ren should be able to tell the difference.

“Answer me, Noiz. What. Did you do?”

“Aoba, calm down –“

“No! I will not calm down!” He turned to face Noiz directly, anger completely taking over the relaxed expression from only moments before. “I specifically told you not to mess with Ren, and you did it anyway!” Noiz was lost and angry with himself for letting his curiosity take over his better judgement. But what could possibly have gone wrong? Aoba was breathing heavily, and were those tears forming? Shit, he had really messed up badly. He hadn’t thought Aoba would be angry enough to cry.

“Aoba, I swear I didn’t do anything but –“

“You did! And I wouldn’t have even noticed if you hadn’t messed up his personality. Bring him back now!” Aoba held Ren out towards Noiz and he took him, holding him, but not moving to plug him in, still in shock at the situation. He should never have touched Ren without permission. No amount of curiosity was worth the anger and sadness directed at him from the one person he couldn’t stand to see it from.

“I’m sorry.” His voice was quieter than he had intended, and shakier.

“You’re not forgiven. Bring him back.” Noiz just nodded and turned to plug him into his monitors. He noted distantly that Aoba was speaking like he had taken away his soul or something, but he didn’t think Aoba realized he was doing it. Anyway, all he needed to do was re-tweak the settings and…

Noiz stopped typing, staring blankly at the screen.

“Nothing changed.”

“What?” Aoba was staring longingly at Ren, but looked up in angry confusion at his words. “What do you mean ‘nothing changed’? Of course something changed, you heard him just now!”

“I’m looking at his data right now. Nothing is different. All of the tweaks and settings are exactly as they were.” Aoba seemed lost, and Noiz, too, felt more and more confused as the seconds ticked by. Everything was exactly the same. He began to panic, but was careful not to show it lest he upset Aoba even more.

“…gone.”

Noiz missed the beginning and turned, asking with his eyes for Aoba to repeat himself.

“Ren is gone. I can feel it.” He looked directly into Noiz’s eyes, despair filling his golden eyes with a dark shadow that Noiz had never seen before. Noiz could physically feel his heart breaking at the coldness in Aoba’s normally warm and welcoming gaze. “I told you not to mess with him.”

“We can fix him, Aoba, I am so –“

“Don’t! Don’t say it.” Noiz could only watch as the first tears spilled down Aoba’s cheeks. Aoba gathered Ren in his arms, powering him off, and stood to walk out of the room. He paused in the doorway.

“I’ll never forgive you.”

The door slammed shut, and Noiz was alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Muss ich fließend klingen? - Do I sound fluent?
> 
> (I think.... I don't speak German, I'm sorry)


	2. Promises

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 2, written for Day 5: Promises! Thanks for reading ^_^

It had been a week, and still no change. For the first few days Aoba was openly angry, and truthfully Noiz preferred that over the despondency he had been showing lately. Even though Noiz was allowed back in the bedroom at night, there was none of their usual cuddling or talking or any of the things Noiz liked best about sleeping with Aoba. He had tried at first, but Aoba had rejected him by rolling over to the other side of the bed, Ren – or his ALLmate body – tucked tightly in his arms.

That was another thing that hurt Noiz more than any shouting ever would. Aoba hadn’t turned the ALLmate on even once since that day, though he had at least stopped carrying it around with him all the time. Noiz would watch him sit on the couch studying or watching TV, stroking the fur absentmindedly, or tucking him in gently on the pillow they had laid out for him on the bedroom floor.

He had been positive that there was a way to fix him, something that he had overlooked before that would explain the sudden change. But as the days went on and he still found nothing, even Noiz was beginning to lose hope in ever bringing Ren back. More than anything, even if Aoba never forgave him for as long as they lived, he just wanted to see him smile again. In order to do that, he needed to fix Ren. But he couldn’t do anything without knowing what was broken in the first place, and since nothing in the data he copied to Usagimodoki showed anything, he would need to look directly at Ren again. The hard part would be getting Aoba to let him.

As usual, Aoba was sitting cross-legged on the couch, a large textbook open in front of him and Ren tucked neatly in his lap, looking for all the world like he was resting in sleep mode.

“Hey, Aoba?” He spoke quietly, timidly, as he had been lately whenever they talked. Not that Aoba had been up for much conversation lately, but still Noiz tried. Aoba was silent for a moment and Noiz thought he was going to ignore him, but then he marked his page and looked back.

“Yes?” His voice was flat, eyes tired like he hadn’t slept in days, though Noiz knew he had. There was no warmth to be seen in his gaze anymore, and it made Noiz sick with guilt.

“May I look at Ren again?” A tiny spark of life flashed in Aoba’s dull irises, though they showed only the beginnings of anger, like he was appalled that Noiz would even ask. Maybe he was.

“No.” Quick as that he turned around and opened his textbook again.

“Aoba, I-“

“I said no, Noiz.” Noiz took a deep breath and closed his eyes. He had known this would be difficult, and had prepared for outright rejection from the start.

“But Aoba, just-“

“No, Noiz!” Aoba slammed his book shut again and set Ren gently on top, standing to face Noiz directly. “Never again! The last time you touched him, he broke, and now Ren is… he’s…” His voice broke at Ren’s name, and Noiz winced at the pain showing through the anger. Tears were forming again and Noiz instinctually moved to step forward, but stopped himself at the last second. It was useless to try to comfort him when he was the cause of all of this. Instead Noiz looked to the floor.

“I messed up. I know that.” He raised his eyes to meet Aoba’s. “But I can’t fix it if you don’t let me try.” He hoped his face showed how sincere he was, and that it would be enough to convince Aoba to let him at least try. “I won’t touch anything. I swear, I’m only going to look. You can watch, if you want.” Aoba looked like he wanted to say something else but was holding back. There was silence between them for almost a beat too long.

“Fine.” Noiz’s eyes widened a fraction. That was much easier than he had thought it would be. “I will watch, and you won’t do anything unless I say it’s okay.” Noiz nodded and Aoba glared a moment longer before turning around to retrieve Ren. Then he followed Noiz into his office where Usagi had all of his data files already pulled up.

Noiz sat down and looked to Aoba who also sat and placed Ren down in front of them. Then he pulled a cord out from one of the monitors and gestured to Ren.

“I’m going to plug him into my monitor and open the data files, okay?” Aoba nodded and Noiz gently turned Ren onto his back and opened him up. “Usagi, open all the data files from the AI chip, and analyze for discrepancies between those and the ones you copied earlier.”

“P! Understood! Scanning files, estimated wait 24 minutes!” Noiz sat back to wait for the scan to be completed, chancing a glance over at Aoba. He was sitting with his knees to chest, staring intently down at the limp ALLmate in front of them, as though if he looked away for even a second he would disappear.

“…I really am sorry.” Aoba didn’t make any indication that he had heard him, not that Noiz was really expecting him to. Apologies wouldn’t bring Ren back, and they sure as hell wouldn’t make up for his mistakes. Being considerate was still a fairly new concept to him, and it was difficult to remember sometimes. Not for the first time, Noiz thought Aoba deserved someone better.

“I know.” Caught up in his thoughts, Noiz almost missed the quiet statement. “I know it’s hard for you sometimes. That’s not an excuse, and I’m still furious with you. But I understand.” This was the longest conversation they had had in a week, and Noiz was loathe to let it die now.

“We’re going to get him back.” This was a new thing for Noiz too, this sort of confident optimism. When you had low expectations you were always either right or pleasantly surprised, so he had no desire to hold high hopes only to be disappointed. But Aoba was different. He wasn’t foolishly optimistic but he appreciated positivity more than Noiz ever had.

“Thank you.” Aoba spoke quietly and huddled even tighter into himself. “I don’t know why I’m so attached to him either. I know it doesn’t make sense – he’s a machine. But somehow I feel like he’s more than that.” Noiz could understand that. It was why he had been so interested in the first place. Ren was always more intelligent, more human-like than any other ALLmate Noiz had ever encountered. “Now that he’s gone I feel like a part of me disappeared with him.” That was something Noiz didn’t, couldn’t understand. It sounded like something too complicated to ask about though, so he didn’t. Just as he opened his mouth to say something more, he was interrupted.

“P! Scan complete! One discrepancy found!” Both Noiz and Aoba sat up straighter as Usagi pulled up and highlighted the error. It was hidden inside of a line of basic program code that Noiz had copied from Ren before, useless and redundant as far as he could tell. Unless Noiz was mistaken, which he usually wasn’t, it was an endless sequence, one that would overwhelm any normal ALLmate processor. It would take a super computer to handle the calculations of something like this. So why was it hidden in Ren’s code?

“Did you write that in there?” He asked Aoba who was scrutinizing the numbers alongside Noiz. He shook his head in confusion.

“No, what does it mean?”

“I don’t know. Normally a sequence like that would crash the processor. It’s too complicated for an ALLmate. Usagi, identify the origin.”

“P! Origin unknown! Creation date: 10 years ago!”

“That’s about when I found him. But I know I didn’t alter his AI code directly, at least not the basic programming.”

Noiz was even more perplexed than he had been – he didn’t like it. A code with unknown origins that should’ve crashed the ALLmate from the beginning… It was the definition of suspicious.

“There were no other differences?”

“P! None detected!”

“…” Noiz was hesitant to rewrite the code into Ren’s chip. What if it was a mistake on Usagi’s end and he broke Ren irreparably?

“Put it back.” When Noiz looked over, Aoba’s eyes were more determined and full of life than they had been since the beginning of all this.

“But Aoba, it’s-“

“I know. It’s dangerous, and it could break Ren irreversibly. But it’s the only chance we have. Put it back.” As much as Noiz was hesitant to do it, he had no choice but to listen to Aoba. This was Aoba’s ALLmate. Noiz had no say in this decision.

“Alright. Usagi, copy the sequence and paste it into Ren’s code exactly where it was.”

“P! Copy and paste complete! No discrepancies between files!” Noiz sighed heavily. Now was the moment of truth.

“Want to start him up?” Aoba gulped and nodded. Either Ren would be back, or the system would be fried. He unplugged him and handed him to Aoba. Noiz was so nervous he almost closed his eyes.

Aoba pressed Ren’s forehead, and he started up with a click.

“…Aoba.” Both sets of eyes widened. He wasn’t broken. That means…

“Ren?! Ren is that you?” Aoba held him up at eye level, staring intently into Ren’s deep artificial eyes.

“Yes. I am sorry for my…absence. Please forgive me.” ALLmates never asked for forgiveness. But Ren did. Aoba’s eyes filled with tears again, and not in sadness.

“Ren!” He sniffled and Noiz watched on, bewildered and grateful to whatever higher power there was that Ren was back. He smiled as he watched his boyfriend cuddle with the fluffy robot. “Ren, what happened? Why did you disappear?” Ren’s ears drooped.

“I do not know. It is difficult to explain. It was a little like a broken connection that I couldn’t self-repair.” Aoba shook his head and smiled at him, pulling Ren into his chest. Ren licked at his cheek since his small arms couldn’t reach around for a hug.

“Doesn’t matter, you’re back now.” He lifted him up again and pressed their foreheads together, a ritual Noiz had witnessed countless times, and still didn’t understand. “Welcome home, Ren.”

“I am glad to be back, Aoba.”

Noiz got up to leave the room, give them some privacy to reunite, but was stopped halfway to the door.

“I’m still angry with you.” Noiz froze, heart clenching. He hadn’t expected to be forgiven so easily but it hurt to hear nonetheless.

“I know.” There was shuffling as Aoba placed Ren on the floor and stood, walking over to wrap his arms around Noiz from behind.

“And I haven’t forgiven you for going behind my back.”

“I know.” Surprised at the sudden change of attitude, Noiz placed a hand over the arms crossed over his stomach.

“I want you to promise me that you won’t do it again.” He turned to face Aoba, looking directly into tear-filled eyes.

“I promise. I promise on everything I have.” Aoba’s crinkled when he smiled up at him, and Noiz’s heart clenched for a different reason.

“I believe you.” Aoba’s arms wrapped around his neck and Noiz pulled him close, pressing a chaste kiss to his lips, and another on his cheek, and another on the corner of his eye, until Aoba giggled and squirmed away.

“Sappy brat.” He turned and picked up Ren, passing Noiz on his way out of the room. “Come on, I’m hungry, and as part of your punishment you’re cooking for the next month. And ordering pizza doesn’t count as cooking!”

Noiz smiled to himself and walked out to the kitchen. As much as he was still learning, as long as Aoba was there to teach him, he thought they would be okay.


End file.
